An Unexpected Adventure
by KartheyM
Summary: For lack of a better title... (I welcome suggestions!) Arthur and Merlin pursue a mysterious thief into the woods, and discover more than they bargained for! What is so special about the article the thief stole? How will they get it back? Can they return to Camelot before it's too late? *Please Read & Review! :)* Set around mid-S3 or so.
1. Chapter 1: To Catch A Thief

"Stop, thief!"

The cry rang across the castle courtyard. Arthur broke off in the middle of discussing a matter with Sir Leon just in time to see a short, ragged figure spur a horse from the stables, obviously bearing something valuable. A guard reached the stable gate by the time the little man and the horse slipped through the closing gate on the far side.  
Arthur stopped the man as Merlin approached.  
"What happened?" Arthur asked the soldier.  
"I was patrolling the halls below, near the stables," the man reported. "I heard a strange noise near one of the horses, and that man emerged."  
"There was a man in the stables and you called him a thief?" Merlin queried.  
"No," the soldier responded, "I saw he carried a golden treasure of some kind, with a large white gem," he explained. "Then I called him a thief."  
"Do we know whom he stole from?"

"Your Highness!" Sir Elyan called as he joined the group, "I believe this message will help." He produced a scroll. "Gaius found it on the table in the great hall."  
Arthur accepted the scroll and broke the seal. He surveyed the letter. When he finished, he eyed Elyan suspiciously. "Any idea who left this?"  
"Doesn't it say who it's from?" Merlin asked, glancing at the strange device on the letter.  
Arthur frowned, "He merely calls himself the Guardian of the realm, and the thing that was stolen is vital to their kingdom's security." His eyes glinted as he glanced up at the knights gathered around him. "It's up to us to get it back."  
Leon stepped forward. "We'd better get started before he reaches the border."  
"Get our horses," Arthur told the soldier who had sighted the thief.  
The man bowed, "Yes, Milord."

Ten minutes later, Arthur and his knights rode out from the city, following the trail of the small, spry thief. Six miles into the Forest of Gillon, they finally caught sight of the little man on the horse. Arthur reined in his horse to regroup and strategize.  
"Elyan, Gwaine, and Percival, you will take the right, and Leon and I will take the left." It was unspoken and taken for granted that Merlin would go with Arthur. The knights nodded and set off in pursuit.  
Arthur led his group, and Merlin hovered close behind.  
"Don't lose sight of him," Arthur cautioned.  
Merlin smiled; the idea had never entered his mind.

Arthur and Merlin soon overtook the man, and headed him off. The horse reared, sending the man tumbling, and his satchel flying. Merlin swung off his horse and caught the man by the collar as Arthur went for the satchel.  
Only then did the warlock notice that Sir Leon and the other knights were nowhere to be seen.  
"All right, you blackguard," Arthur strode over to him, pulling a white gem as big as his hand from the dingy satchel. "What can you tell us about how you came by this?"  
The dirty little man only leered. His strange black eyes twinkled. Merlin sensed something different about him. The stranger, in answer, began to mutter under his breath. Merlin realized in alarm that he was casting a spell! He dropped the man's collar and dove toward the king.  
"Look out!"

A massive rush of wind blasted around them. When Arthur and Merlin opened their eyes, they stood in the middle of a field. Somehow, night had fallen—and there were strange growls coming from all around them.  
Arthur drew his sword and pulled Merlin close behind him.  
"Stay behind me," he barked, as their assailants came into view. Arthur squinted, "What the—"  
The creatures swarming toward them were unlike anything they had ever encountered. The squat creatures had motley green-brown skin and bulbous yellow eyes, a bit like scaly, oversized frogs. Many of them carried clubs, torches, and small, needle-like rapiers. They bared their fangs viciously as they charged toward the pair.  
Master and servant stood back to back as Arthur swiped and slashed at any creature that got within arm's reach. The horde surged right past them, evidently intent on some target beyond them. Arthur and Merlin turned around as a living, moving mass of light blossomed out of the woods behind them and washed over the enemies. They stood, stunned, as the light divided into smaller points and enveloped the froglike goblins.  
"Fairies," Merlin gasped under his breath.  
The goblins still emerged from the shadows. Arthur's wits returned to him, and he began engaging the goblins with his sword. Merlin moved away from Arthur and stared carefully at the mass of creatures. Concentrating hard, he muttered a repelling spell under his breath.  
Nothing happened. Merlin tried a striking spell; still, his words seemed to have no effect on the goblins. In fact, his actions and his lack of a weapon  
had now attracted the attention of a gang of goblins, who fairly climbed over the top of each other to get to him. Merlin frantically looked around and got his hands on a sturdy fallen branch. He swung at the goblins, lucky that it did not take much effort to topple them, because he had used magic so often, he was not much used to actual physical combat, particularly not against thick, heavy creatures like these goblins!  
Fairies flew about, inadvertently confusing their human allies as they swarmed over the goblins. Merlin looked over and saw that Arthur was now attempting to fight with his left hand. His right arm hung uselessly at his side. The manservant brained a few more goblins before a sharp pain erupted in his leg. He looked down at a fresh cut just above his knee. He couldn't move his leg. Another goblin nicked his wrist, and the branch dropped from his hand. Merlin could do little beyond throwing his arms over his head to stop the blow from a goblin's club that knocked him senseless.

_*A/N: Those who have read my Warehouse 13 episode ("The Return of MacPherson") may recognize the world Merlin and Arthur come to. In case you wonder how the two episodes could fit... they can't; there will be a few familiar characters, but the two plots are unrelated. Just so you know. -KM_


	2. Chapter 2: Merlin and the Gryphon

When Merlin regained consciousness, the midday sun spilled it's light through the trees over him, and he could not move a muscle. He could feel, all right. His mouth burned as if he had just consumed the hottest spices in existence. There were several cuts about his limbs which stung almost unbearably. He was not sore; it only felt like he did not have the physical capacity to move. He wondered how Arthur fared.  
"Arthur?" Merlin called. He half-expected the young king to be on his feet still, waiting just outside Merlin's line of sight, shaking with silent laughter at the pathetic predicament.  
"Arthur, are you there?" When several minutes passed in complete silence, Merlin began to wish Arthur was there to laugh at his embarrassment, if it only confirmed he was there and alive.  
"Arthur!"  
The only response was the shriek of an eagle; or was it an eagle? This place had goblins and fairies, why would it not have a magical creature with an eagle's head—like a gryphon?  
The cry sounded closer, but there was nothing Merlin could do. If he could have moved, he would have been trembling. He recalled only too well the gryphon that had attacked Camelot. There was no Lancelot to save him now. He barely glimpsed the form of the lion-sized creature as it landed near him. Merlin lay very still and hoped that the beast couldn't see him (or Arthur, but the young king could have been long gone by now).  
The gryphon crept closer. Now Merlin could see its eagle's head. The gryphon suddenly turned its head from side to side, fixing Merlin with each of its eyes. It did not charge forward angrily and hungrily like the other gryphon had. Merlin could do no more than wince as the gryphon stood over him and brought its beak down to rest on his chest. The pair stared into each others' eyes.  
Abruptly, the gryphon's head jerked up, and without warning, it pounced! Its claws dug into Merlin's shoulders, and as it secured its grip, Merlin guessed what it intended to do.  
"Oh, no, no, no!" he begged, but to no avail. The gryphon reared on its haunches with Merlin firmly suspended from its foreclaws, and launched itself into the air. Merlin groaned in pain as the only things between him and a freefall to certain death were the sharp claws digging into his shoulder. Yet his body still would not move. Was he somehow permanently paralyzed?

The gryphon flew over the edge of a mountain range and into a craggy valley. Merlin saw several caves equipped with outcroppings. The gryphon landed on one of these. Merlin almost wished that he was numb as well as paralyzed when the gryphon released him suddenly, sending the young man thudding in more or less a sitting position against the wall of the cave. The gryphon regarded him with each eye once more, then stalked toward the back of the cave, where there stood a large nest. The minute its head cleared the edge of the nest, Merlin heard raspy, grunting, peeping sounds. Great; so if he wasn't going to be supper for the great beast, he would be fodder for its babies.  
The gryphon dipped into the nest and drew out several young gryflets. If the situation was not so perilous, Merlin might have laughed at their bulging eyes and wild, downy feathers sticking out in every direction from their scrawny heads. The gryflets stumbled and flopped their way over to this new creature their mother had brought back. They emitted pathetic growls and snapped their soft beaks at him. One little challenger clawed at his clothes, ripping Merlin's jacket. Something metallic clinked against the stone floor. Instantly, the mother gryphon stood over him, tipping her head back and forth, but Merlin did not warrant her attention. She bent down and picked up a long golden chain. Merlin watched it glimmer as it dangled from her beak. That was the other object the thief had carried! He must have slipped it into Merlin's pocket before he uttered the spell that brought them here. Now the gryphon carefully laid it over Merlin's head, and it dropped around his neck.  
A jolt like a spearhead shot down the length of Merlin's spine, and the brood of gryflets tumbled off with surprised squeaks when Merlin finally stirred and sat upright. His head spun, but at least he could move again. One gryflet managed to stay in his lap, and now it fixed its round eyes on him and growled, snapping its beak at him. Merlin chuckled and—taking care to move slowly—he reached out and gently stroked the gryflet's silky back. The youngling couldn't quite reach Merlin's hand with its beak, and as it felt the soothing movement, its head ever so slightly began to droop. Merlin kept stroking; the fur on the gryflet's back was softer than anything he had ever felt. As the small creature began to curl into a ball, Merlin felt a small, steady movement he realized was the gryflet's purr. The eyes closed, and soon the gryflet was fast asleep in Merlin's lap. He glanced across at the mother gryphon, who crouched silently nearby, regarding him with a mixture of gratification and awe. Gently, Merlin cradled the gryflet in his arms and stood. The nest was almost as tall as he was, and several gryflets played, but Merlin set the sleeping one off to the side where he would not be disturbed. When he turned, the gryphon still watched him. She stalked closer, her lion's tail waving in apprehension. Merlin waited patiently for her. The gryphon came close enough to brush her head along his hand. She nudged against it, inviting him. Merlin almost held his breath as he slowly reached toward the gentle creature. She leaned into his palm, croaking softly with pleasure.

"Kharrah?" A feminine voice called. "Where are you?"  
Kharrah the gryphon bounded toward the front of the cave. Merlin started to follow her, but just then, a giant face loomed over the mouth of the cave. Enormous eyes blinked at him, and Merlin instinctively sought to cower in the shadows and hide from the terrible face.  
"What in the world—" the giant muttered, and the face pulled away, only to be replaced by a huge hand! Merlin dove for the cover of the nest, but two of the giant's fingers caught his boot, hauling him out by one foot.

"Eww!" the giantess shrieked, and Merlin felt himself hurtling through the air toward the ground. An enormous face grimaced at him. "It's squishy! And... oh, gross! It's _moving! _Kharrah, what is it?"

Merlin could only ease himself onto his back and groan. His whole body felt made of bruises. The giantess watched him with a strange gleam in her eye, similar to the way he looked at a large spider. He tried to raise his hands over his head for protection.

"Don't squash me!" He begged, "I mean you no harm!"

The giantess clapped a hand to her mouth, "It talks!" Very slowly, she reached out and pinched Merlin's body between two fingers. Merlin threw his arms around her thumb for balance as she lifted him high in the air before her face and dropped him into her other palm. "But you're so much bigger than a dwarf!" she remarked.

Merlin's head swam as he found himself huddled among fingers as big as his entire body. He struggled to get his balance among them.

The giantess, meanwhile, was becoming more accustomed to his presence. "Shh, it's okay," she assured him gently, "I won't hurt you. See? I'm a friend." She opened her hand, and Merlin slid into her palm.  
The giant regarded him like a strange-looking insect. "What are you?" she asked.  
"I'm—" Merlin almost said "a servant," but just in time he realized she most likely meant species, not occupation. "I'm a human," he answered.  
The giant furrowed her brow in confusion. The wrinkles stood out deeply in her face.  
"Humans? There haven't been any humans here for—ever!" she eyed Merlin suspiciously. "I didn't think they existed."  
Merlin shook his head and laughed. This giant truly was a friend. "Where I come from," he remarked, "humans exist but giants like you don't."  
"Hmm," The giant propped her elbow on a grassy knoll on top of the cave to hold the hand supporting Merlin steady. "And what world is that?"  
Merlin found himself beginning to trust the young giant. At any rate, she seemed interested, and perhaps the more she knew about him, the more she would be inclined to protect and maybe even aid him.  
"It's called Earth," he explained, "I live in a country called Albion, in the royal city of Camelot."  
"Camelot," the giantess sounded out the name.  
Merlin couldn't help grinning as he said, "Yes, that's it." He worked his way onto his feet now, standing on the soft, uneven surface of her hand. He walked to the edge—but not too close—and seated himself with his feet dangling over the side.  
"My name is Merlin," he said. "What's yours?"  
The giantess smiled and tucked a lock of her brown hair behind her ear. "It's Lilianancirellaminalibriella ."  
He could not deny that it sounded beautiful coming from her mouth, but— "Can I just call you Lily?" he asked.  
The look she gave him said she could not fathom why anyone would need to.  
"I suppose," she conceded. "But tell me, Merlin, what brings you to Phantasm?"  
Merlin blinked. "To _where_, now?" he asked, not recognizing the foreign word.  
"Phantasm," Lily repeated, "That's what this world is called."  
A wave of dizziness washed over Merlin as he stared out over the horizon. So the magic of the thief had not just transported Merlin and his master to a different realm or kingdom; somehow they ended up in a different world altogether! Merlin shivered and tucked his knees against his chest.  
"Lily," he said, "Let me tell you how we came to be here."  
"We?" asked Lily.


	3. Chapter 3: In the Company of Trolls

Arthur opened his eyes sometime after dawn. His entire body hurt, but his chain mail and his skill with the sword had prevented any of the goblins with rapiers from scoring any hits beyond the wound in his right shoulder. Already the pain was fading. Arthur glanced up just as a gigantic creature like a lion landed with a heavy thud and a shriek like an eagle. A gryphon! Arthur was so petrified that he dared not breathe, not even when the beast carried his faithful servant screaming into the air. Only after the gryphon reached the treetops did Arthur finally spring to his feet, sword in hand, screaming dire and impossible threats after the animal. Then King Arthur of Camelot was truly alone in a strange land, with nothing but his sword, his armor, and a strange white gem bigger than any he had ever seen.  
Arthur trudged to the edge of the forest. On vines twining around the trees hung large yellow fruits. Arthur sliced one open with his knife. The flesh inside was orange and juicy, much like a melon. Arthur munched as he strode toward a winding road that led out of the forest.

He walked out into a wide plain and bright sun. Arthur paused when he saw figures coming toward him, but as they approached they seemed less and less threatening. (He could even hear them singing snatches.) Moreover, he could easily tell that these figures were not human. Their short, stocky stature proclaimed them as dwarves. Arthur relaxed; perhaps this magical land wasn't so treacherous after all.  
He hailed the dwarves as they approached.  
"Good dwarves," he said, "could you tell me where I might find the nearest town?"  
The dwarves all stared at him as if they had never seen a knight before. Their leader even approached Arthur and asked, "We are but humble dwarves, and I am called Wardell. What are you, O Tall one, and what are you called?"  
Arthur nodded and accepted the respectful introduction. "I am a knight," he announced, "and Arthur is my name. I have an urgent need for refreshment, perhaps a place to stay—"  
Wardell nodded sagely, stroking his deep, dark beard in thought. "I am afraid the nearest town is many miles away, good knight," he stated. "But my clan and I were just on our way to visit a large camp which you will no doubt find plenty of refreshment and every comfort. Be so kind as to consort with us, o great one, and we will see that you arrive in safety and good spirits."  
Arthur smiled; these dwarves were certainly more polite than any other dwarves he'd ever met. As long as they kept piling on the compliments, he didn't think he would have any problems.

Arthur was quite comfortable in the company of the dwarves by the time they neared the camp. He told them about Camelot and Albion (but not of his royalty; that was unnecessary, seeing as they revered him enough for his knighthood as it was), of his incredible hunting skills and countless adventures. In return they told him of their world, Phantasm, and how he had the distinct privilege of being the only knight in existence. Arthur had only paused in talking about himself long enough to recall the gryphon carrying Merlin away, when they arrived at the edge of the camp. A new sort of creature strode out to meet them.  
Arthur stopped dead in his tracks and rather rudely shouted out, "Good Lord, what is _that_?"

It was about the same shape as a dwarf, but far more bulky, and a hulking seven feet tall. It looked (and smelled) like a cross between a dwarf and a boar. The creature stood uptight like a dwarf, but the limbs and gut were a good deal rounder and thicker. The nose had a squashed hook-shape to it. The eyes were buried between bulging jowls and a sagging brow. The ears were triangular in shape, and hung with glinting gold rings. The creature wore several layers of tattered swatches of rich fabric. He squatted low, bowed his turbaned head, and raised his hand, a somewhat theatrical demonstration of respect.  
"Welcome, one and all," he said in a deep bass voice, his dark eyes twinkling in the light of many lanterns. "Wardell, my compatriot, how good you have reached our camp by nightfall. We did not think that you were coming—" he glanced down at Arthur, "or that you were bringing us a magnificent guest."  
Wardell clapped Arthur in the middle of his back, which was as high as the dwarf could reach. "This here is Arthur," he stated, "a knight of Camelot. He has just arrived, and desires to see the glory of Phantasm before he departs." He turned to Arthur, "Sir Arthur," he announced, "May I have the honor of intoducing my friend, Garrgan, the most noble troll who ever lived!"  
Garrgan bowed to Arthur, who was surprised and relieved that apparently, the trolls at least in Phantasm were far nicer than the trolls in Camelot.  
Garrgan led the dwarves and Arthur to the center of camp, where trolls feasted, drank, and danced. It pleased the young king even more that these trolls ate heartily of cooked stew brimming with roots and meat in a rich broth. The drink made him lightheaded at first, but he grew accustomed to the flavor and even came to enjoy it. When the dwarves and trolls brought out instruments, Arthur jumped to his feet along with the others and danced as heartily as any among them. He laughed, cheered, drank, and ate until he was so tired the trolls practically had to carry him into a tent already prepared with a soft couch.  
Arthur's head rang as if the band still played, but there were at least two voices conversing that the noise could not eclipse. He was only slightly aware they were talking about him, but he listened without reacting or comprehending.  
"What did you say the creature was, Ward?"  
"He called hisself a knight or summat."  
"A knight, you thickhead? That there's a 'uman if I ever saw one!"  
"Garrg, have you ever seen a human?"  
"Naw, but I sure know that if anything is a human, that 'un is!"  
Silence hung for several moments.  
"So what?"  
"So what?" Garrgan choked. "So, d'you know the market for a glimpse of a human? Wardell, my friend—I'd be willing to give each of your clan as much as they could carry, if only you let the human stay."  
"Y'don't say?" Wardell mused.  
"I would, too; we could make it all back. But you know how much trouble I'd have explaining how we left that much behind in one place. So I'm afraid you'll have to settle for about half that."  
Silence again.  
"How fortunate to have a friend in these dark days, Garrgan."  
"Indeed, we are most fortunate, Wardell."

_Fortunate to have friends,_Arthur dimly mused as the cushion he reclined on seemed to fold closely around him, like a gigantic hug. He had a friend, too; he was fortunate...

"Wakey, wakey, human!"  
Arthur struggled to open his eyes against the blinding light of the midday sun. His whole body ached, he could not move, and his mouth seemed strangely sore and unable to close properly.  
Finally, the light relaxed, and Arthur opened his eyes. The trolls he saw were much more menacing than the carousing wanderers of the previous night. No sooner did he open his eyes than the troll who had spoken to him dumped a bucket of dirty, frigid water over his head. Arthur wanted to yell, but all he could manage was a muffled grunt. A dirty strip of cloth tied around his mouth held his head against a post behind him, the same one his hands and feet were also fastened against. This post was firmly attached at the center of a large, open wagon. Arthur stood at the center of a group of towering, seven-foot trolls, who grinned at him. The one called Garrgan stepped forward as Arthur frantically and fruitlessly flailed against his bonds.  
"Now, now," Garrgan laid a beefy hand on Arthur's head as a few of the trolls laughed, "Wardell said you wanted to see the sights, and we couldn't let you sleep away and miss them, now could we?" the whole wagon burst out laughing. Arthur gazed around the moving wagon. They were headed for a dark area, full of craggy cliffs and dilapidated buildings.  
"Welcome to Phantasm, human!" Garrgan teased, mocking the welcome he had given Wardell the night before.

_Wardell_—Arthur felt his gut wrench as he realized the flattering dwarf had willingly parted with him for a vast enough sum of money.  
Garrgan saw the realization on his face. "Ehh," he waved dismissively, "anyone will tell you not to trust a flattering dwarf, but it happens to work in my favor, so where's the harm?"  
They pulled up to a large castle. Somehow, the trolls merely pulled Arthur away from the post and he came, bonds and all. Arthur immediately began hunting for a wall he could scrape the rope against to free himself, but Garrgan hooked his arm through Arthur's and dragged him close.  
"Don't bother trying to figure out how to escape troll rope. It's enchanted, and the only way out of it is enchantment." He laughed as he tossed Arthur into a room with only a bed, a plate, a cup, and windows far too narrow for even a slender girl to fit through. A second troll threw in Arthur's mail, his sword, and his satchel after him.  
"Sleep well, human," Garrgan called, "You'll want your strength tonight!"  
Arthur tried to work himself over to the bed, since his limbs were still tied. He tried to sleep, but it did not happen very much. He could only dream what the troll meant, and every dream was a nightmare.


	4. Chapter 4: The Red-Horned Unicorn

"—and I was completely paralyzed until just before you found me," Merlin finished.  
Lily had listened patiently as Merlin took the better part of an hour to explain the history of his adventure thus far.  
"So where do you suppose Arthur is now?" Lily asked.  
Merlin's shoulders sagged. "I don't know," he admitted as a cold weight settled over his chest. "I could not discern if he was still in the forest when the gryphon carried me away. I have no idea if some fearsome beast carried him away, or perhaps he managed to escape the forest, or perhaps he was gone when I revived, and returned after I was gone—"  
"Merlin," Lily nudged him with her finger, "stop. Worrying and chiding yourself will do nothing to find your friend. Besides, you have other matters to contend with. You said before that the thief had two items that you and Arthur retrieved?"  
"Yes; Arthur found the large white gem, and I ended up with this chain," Merlin lifted it to show her.  
Lily gasped. "Keep it hidden!" she hissed at him.  
Merlin hastily tucked the chain back under his collar. "Why?" he asked.  
"The Chain is the most powerful bit of enchantment in this world. No one knows where its power comes from, but it has protected Phantasm for many lifetimes. Together with the gyth—that's the gem your friend has—it forms the Phantasmagyth, worn and guarded by the red-horned unicorn," she hesitated, "until recently."  
"What happened?" Merlin asked.  
Lily shuddered and lowered her hand to the ground so Merlin could sit on a rock at her eye level.  
"The wizard came," she whispered ominously.  
Merlin recalled his own lack of power. "How could a wizard do magic here?" he asked. "I am a warlock in my world, but I have no power here."  
Lily huffed, "Interesting; perhaps because you only know the magic of your world. It is said that the wizard knows Phantasmian magic. That is how he was able to summon the Underworlders."  
"Underworlders? You mean the goblins?"  
"Yes, and there are others," Lily confirmed. "Normally, they are trapped under the surface of Phantasm, in their own realm, with no way to reach the surface. Only a certain magic spell can summon them to the surface. When the spell is invoked, the Phantasmagyth loses its power, and the red-horned unicorn is easily caught and—"  
She hesitated, so Merlin guessed, "Killed?"  
Lily shook her head, "No; killing it would curse the whole world to eternal turmoil. Not even a malevolent wizard would be that foolish. Typically the Unicorn is imprisoned while the Phantasmagyth is taken from him. The removal of the Phantasmagyth opens portals into other worlds; the fabric of time and space is rendered unstable. The fact that the two halves of the Phantasmagyth ended up in your world means that whoever had it must have taken it from the wizard—unless he was the one to overpower the unicorn himself." She looked down at Merlin, who stood and was pacing, deep in thought.  
"The thief—you say there are no humans here?" He murmured to himself, "Yet I could have sworn he was one...only there was something strange about the eyes."  
"Could it have been a troll?" Lily offered.  
Merlin stopped; the thief's appearance certainly did not match that of any trolls he'd seen; perhaps they looked a bit different in this world. Their behavior was still very much the same! "Likely so," he agreed.  
"Great, so: a troll overpowered the unicorn and stole the Phantasmagyth, escaping through a portal into your world."  
"Arthur and I chase him into the woods, where he casts the spell to send us back," Merlin contributed.  
Lily snorted, "Ha! Troll magic is not that powerful; he probably just knew when and where the portal would be, and started muttering what you assumed was a curse to frighten you."  
"So now what do I have to do?" Merlin stopped and looked up at the giantess. "Find Arthur, find a portal, and go back?"  
"It's not that simple, Merlin," Lily said. "Now that both halves of the Phantasmagyth have returned to Phantasm, the portals are all closed. The Phantasmagyth must be restored to open them again, so you can return home."  
Merlin sighed and flopped on the grass. "Well, that's it, then." He looked up at Lily. "We've got to find Arthur before he gives the gyth away or loses it."  
Lily laid out her hand, and Merlin stepped into it. "Well, based on what you've told me, Merlin, I think I know where he might be."  
Merlin jerked in surprise, "Where?"  
"The trolls; they have been running rampant since the rise of the Underworlders. They probably took him like they took my brother."  
"Your brother?"  
"Yes; they keep him locked up in the Troll Castle."  
"Wait a minute," Merlin spluttered, "if you know where your brother is, why haven't you rescued him before now?"  
Lily scowled, "It's not like I haven't tried! Troll Castle is protected by the very strongest troll magic in existence. I can't get anywhere near the place; the only creatures here who might have a chance are the dwarves, and they are far too greedy for the trolls' gold and favors to risk crossing them." She smiled, "That is, until you came. As long as you're reasonably sized like a troll, you should be able to pass through the barrier unharmed."  
Merlin nodded, grinning in spite of himself. "I've always wanted to storm a castle."  
Lily glanced at the setting sun. "We won't be able to get there before nightfall. Looks like you'll be spending the night here."  
Merlin shrugged, "Oh, it will be all right; I think Kharrah and I are on good terms now."  
Lily helped Merlin down to the overhang. He saw that the gryphon had already prepared him a miniature nest of his own. "Goodnight, Lily."  
"Goodnight, Merlin; I'll wake you at first light."


	5. Chapter 5: The Troll Castle

Many leagues away, Arthur's night was only beginning. The trolls tied him to a post again, one mounted on a small platform. They carried the platform to a large arena of some sort. Arthur saw many benches. He wondered if the audience would be more trolls. Next to him, on platforms similar to his, a gryphon nursed its many wounds. Beyond it, Arthur saw a unicorn with a blood-red horn. It stood unevenly on three legs, as the fourth had a gaping red wound near the hock. At the end, he saw a tall cage full of the glowing creatures he had seen the night before. Arthur concluded that these must be fairies.  
A large tent lowered over the group, and Arthur heard the bellows, snorts, and screeches of their newly-arrived audience.  
The voice of Garrgan rang out, "Hear ye! I am about to present to you a sight both familiar, and never-before-seen! You will see your beloved fights—" hoots and cheers from the audience "—and you will see a new sight, just arrived from worlds beyond, one that no other creature has ever laid eyes on!"  
Arthur braced himself as the curtain began to rise.  
"Underworlders," Garrgan finished, "I give you—the HUMAN!"

If the Underworlders were shocked to see Arthur, he was even more so to see such a nightmarish array of creatures: hags, werewolves, minotaurs, ogres, scores of goblins, and even several giant Cyclopes gathered to watch the spectacle. Well, they mostly watched.  
Arthur jerked in surprise as a large, rotten fruit sailed through the air and struck the gryphon full in the face. All of the Underworlders took pleasure in hurling rotten fruits and vegetables at the prisoners. Arthur now understood what it must feel like to be in the stocks. A fruit like a squishy brown tomato struck him full in the face and splattered down his neck. Arthur learned to keep his mouth and eyes shut. He kept telling himself just to wait until it was over.  
After a while, the trolls began selecting prisoners and bringing them to another arena for "the fights." The Underworlders evidently knew what was going on, for they soon lost interest in pelting the remaining prisoners, and caught up in something else they could see going on below the stage with the platforms, which Arthur could not see. Finally, it was down to the unicorn and Arthur. Of course, the Underworlders "selected" Arthur as the next fighter (via an increased volume of pelting).  
Garrgan dragged him away from the post and handed him his belongings.  
"I think you'll be needing these, human," he warned, "we want you to survive your first night at least! You're our star attraction!" He waited just long enough for Arthur to slip everything on, then shoved him through a door. Arthur immediately dropped down a long chute and landed somewhere completely dark except for a few weak torches. The room was vast, dotted with the thick pillars that supported the stage. Arthur saw a door at the far end of the room.  
The Underworlders began chanting, "Fight! Fight! Fight!" and Arthur heard the loud groaning of some colossal pulley. To his astonishment, light flooded the room as not just the door but the entire back wall raised into the ceiling. Nothing prepared him for what he saw waiting for him on the other side of that wall.

A toe as big as his head. A toe attached to a foot, attached to a leg, that bent to support an arm, raised to protect a head that just barely brushed the twenty-foot ceiling of the arena, all of which belonged to a giant boy. A very frightened, but very dangerous giant boy. Arthur was no more than a dry twig to the boy. One squeeze of his fingers, and Arthur would be dead. Arthur gripped his sword, trying to ignore his heart beating so hard it threatened to burst from his chest. The boy stared at him, blinking slowly. Arthur felt he could not breathe. He dove behind the nearest pillar. He heard the clanking of enormous chains as the boy's manacled hand appeared beside him. Arthur quickly stabbed at the hand, and cringed as the boy roared in pain and pulled his hand away. Arthur took advantage of the distraction and ran to another pillar, closer to him. He fought to keep himself still as the hands groped around some other pillars. One hand felt the ground right next to Arthur's feet, and probably would have snapped him up in the next instant, had not Arthur reacted so swiftly. Giving the giant another jab in the hand, Arthur dashed back across the room. He had not reckoned that the giant would not move his hand like last time. A slight flick of his fingers sent Arthur flying back against a pillar. The sword clattered away from his hand. Arthur was completely defenseless. He could not muster the strength to move.

Just then, he heard Garrgan's voice, "Thank you all, it is nearly dawn. I am afraid we will have to continue the fight tomorrow night. Please return to your homes before the sunrise."  
There was an extended cacophony as all the creatures filed out of the arena, but no trolls came down to retrieve Arthur. He would have to spend the day down there with the giant.


	6. Chapter 6: Freeing The Giant

"They don't ever come down if they can help it."  
The voice filled the cavernous hall, but it could not be the giant who spoke so kindly—could it? Arthur could just barely make out the hand slowly headed for him again, so he pushed himself up and tried to crawl backwards, but the fingers caught him around the waist. Arthur could not escape his grasp. He decided to let his whole body go limp and play dead. The ruse worked.  
"Oh," the boy moaned as he gently carried Arthur closer and laid his body on the ground in front of his giant feet. "I didn't mean to kill him!" He prodded Arthur's body, "I try not to kill anyone. I only knock them over a bit because then the trolls do not beat me for not fighting back. I am so sorry, human! Please do not be dead!"

Arthur heard the splash of liquid, and carefully cracked one eye. The giant boy must be quite young, he surmised, for in his distress over a supposed killing, he was now shedding tears, each one nearly a gallon of liquid.  
He feigned a fainting spell and rolled over slowly, as if he had just regained consciousness.  
"Oh, my head," he groaned, not entirely faking it, for the fall really had hurt his head.  
The boy sniffed and laughed, scrubbing the tears from his face. "You're alive! Oh, I'm so glad! I've never seen one of your kind before; I nearly thought the fall had killed you. I was so frightened." The giant extended a hand to pick him up again, but Arthur pushed his fingers away.  
"No thank you," he panted, still wary of the giant, "I've got it." he eased himself backward until he could lean against a pillar. He was still gasping for breath. Giant and human regarded one another solemnly.  
"What's your name?" Arthur asked.  
The giant shifted his position so that he was resting on his hands and knees, with his face very close to Arthur's.  
"Calebryanicolinathanderson," he answered. "What's yours?"  
Arthur blinked at the size of the name. "My name is Arthur. Tell me, Caleb Ryan Nico—whatever." He found he could not manage what had come from the boy's mouth easy enough. "Do you mind if I just call you Caleb?"  
The boy shrugged one shoulder, "Most non-giants call me Freak, Monster, or Giant anyway, so Caleb is fine."  
Arthur finally relaxed enough to smile at Caleb. "Tell me, Caleb," he said again, "how did one such as yourself get caught by these trolls?"  
Caleb hung his head as his face turned red. "The same way they catch everyone. I was alone and they invited me to join their party at the campfire."  
Arthur knew only too well the effects of troll-liquor.  
Caleb continued, "They offered me barrels of the fizzy drink, and when I awoke the next morning, they had me all tied up in troll-rope. They force me to fight other creatures for their entertainment."  
Arthur pondered this for a moment. "But you don't kill them?" he mused.  
Caleb shook his head, blushing deeply. "The truth is, most of them have been badly beaten by the Underworlders before they are sent down anyway, so they themselves can't fight very well. So we make jabs at each other, I usually end up knocking them out so they look dead, and then—" Caleb glanced furtively around, and pointed to the frieze against the back of the wall.  
"From below, it looks like this wall goes all the way to the ceiling, but only I can see that it doesn't." He glanced down at Arthur shyly. "Do you want to see?" Caleb laid his hand on the ground next to Arthur.  
Arthur glanced at it. The index finger alone was almost as long and just as thick as his own body. Cautiously, he crawled over and onto the palm. Caleb moved very slowly, raising his hand so that Arthur could see behind the frieze. Sure enough, there was a space about two feet tall and five feet wide, and Arthur could see a wide hole in the wall. A fresh breeze blew through his hair.  
"You hide them here, and they escape," he guessed, turning back to the giant.  
Caleb smiled in response.  
"The Underworlders never notice, and I don't have to kill anyone." He set Arthur back on the ground again.  
The young king glanced around at the odd bones and carcasses lying about. "What about those?" he asked.  
Caleb winced. "On the nights when no fighting would take place, they would throw me old cart-ponies to eat. There was no way to make a fire, though, so I have only survived on what the fairies make for me."  
"You let fairies cook for you?" Arthur repeated incredulously.  
Caleb smiled, "They're better than you think. And I never said anything about cooking. Fairies make food, not just cooked food. Their homes are large melons called misti. Here, they make them especially for me to eat, rather than living in them." Caleb sighed, "I would have died otherwise."  
Arthur surveyed the huge, gentle giant who had spent the entire of his imprisonment setting others free.  
"Caleb," he decided, "I'm going to help you get free."  
The giant stopped fiddling with his shackles. "How?" he asked.  
Arthur glanced around the room. If the pillars at the center supported the arena then the ones around the edges, like the ones Caleb was shackled to, probably supported the seats, maybe even the walls themselves.  
"The pillars," he told the giant, gesturing to the one on Caleb's left. "Can you topple them?"  
Caleb reached out with his left hand, bracing his feet against an opposite pillar. The stone did not budge.  
Caleb sighed, "Not with one hand. With two, maybe, but even if I did, I would still be wearing these chains."  
Arthur inspected the huge padlock. Very carefully, he inserted the blade of his sword into the lock. Twisting delicately, he felt for the latch and pressed against it with the blade. Something snapped, and Arthur quickly drew his sword out, fearful that he had broken the tip, but instead, the shackle fell from Caleb's wrist.  
The giant stared at him in awe. "You're going to help me get out of here?"  
Arthur smiled. "Indeed I am; now, Caleb, push the pillars!"


	7. Chapter 7: Captured Again

In the arena, Garrgan was going over the agenda for the next night's performance. He didn't doubt that the human's day had been terrifying, maybe the giant had already caught him and eaten him. Garrgan hoped this wasn't the case. Even the half of the beginnings of a fight they had seen from him yesterday had set tongues wagging, promising a packed house tonight. He would not even bother with gathering more creatures. The giant had this odd habit of toying with its victims till dawn, and then consuming them in private, or something. A battle between a human with a sword and a giant was sure to bring in plenty of gold. Thank the fates Wardell had found him. Anyone else, and Garrgan would not have gotten him so easily. That bit about the Troll King had been a master stroke. The dumb dwarf had no idea that the trolls were their own masters, not ruled by kings, and the only one pocketing any money at all was Garrgan himself. Garrgan glanced at his schedule again.  
Suddenly, a massive earthquake shook the castle, throwing the trolls onto their faces. When they looked up and blew the dust from their eyes, half of the auditorium was gone, and in its place was a very annoyed, very free giant boy.  
"You trolls!" he yelled at the trembling monsters, "You are terrible, and may you never collect an ounce of gold again!" With this terrible oath, the giant bent down, grabbed the human—very much alive—from the underground chamber, plucked the wounded unicorn from the platform, and stepped right out of the dungeon and through the wall of the castle.

Garrgan could not move until the giant was outside the castle courtyard. Then he roused all the Underworlders, clanging bells and shouting, "The giant has escaped! He's taken the human and the unicorn! Giant on the loose, don't let him get away!"

Caleb glanced over his shoulder at the monstrous horde chasing after them.  
"Oh no!" he cried. "What do we do now, Arthur?"  
"Just keep running, Caleb!" Arthur called to him. "You've been their prisoner long enough; you do not want to be caught by them again!"  
The boy obediently ran, but he did not make it far before he misjudged a step and tripped on a forest. His hands cushioned the fall for Arthur and the unicorn, but it was still terrifying and very painful. The force of his fall broke his grasp when he hit the ground, and Arthur and the unicorn tumbled away. Instantly, the Underworlders burst from their tunnels underground, grabbing and pinning the two smaller creatures. Caleb wriggled free and fought his way out.  
"I'll save you, Arthur!" he called, "I will repay you for how you have helped me! I'll get someone to help me, and I'll find you again!" With that, he took five long paces into the mountains and was gone.  
Arthur could not budge an inch as goblins held his arms and legs tight against the ground.  
"So," Garrgan barked as he strode forward, "the human is a smart one, eh? He thinks," In one terrible swoop, the troll hefted Arthur completely off the ground and just inches from his face, "He thinks he can save the giant and the unicorn and himself, all at once, does he?" Garrgan spit in Arthur's face. "You've destroyed our castle, you've gotten rid of our chief entertainment, you think I'm going to let you live, even if you're the only human here?" Garrgan raised his fist, and Arthur did not doubt the troll lacked the motivation or the capacity to crush his skull.  
"Wait!" he cried. "I have something you will want!"  
"Ha!" Garrgan laughed in his face, "What could you possibly have that I want?"  
"Something more valuable than gold."  
"All right," Garrgan dropped Arthur, but the trolls still surrounded him, leering dangerously. "What do you have that could possibly be more valuable than gold?"  
"A gem," Arthur stated, holding the troll's gaze, "the largest gem the world has ever seen. A single jewel as big as—" Arthur glanced down at Garrgan's hand, "—your fist."  
Garrgan's eyes glinted. He crossed his arms. "All right, human," he challenged, "Show me this gem of yours."  
Arthur reached into his satchel and pulled out the gem he had retrieved from the thief in the forest. As he had hoped, all the trolls gasped at the sight of it.  
"Here is my bargain, Troll," he declared regally, "My life for this jewel. Allow me to go free, and I would willingly part with this priceless treas—"  
Before the last word left his mouth, Garrgan wrapped his arm around Arthur's neck, lifting him off the ground in a chokehold.  
Arthur squirmed and pulled at the suffocating grip, but Garrgan was too big and strong.  
"Let...me...go!" he rasped.  
Garrgan had Arthur pinned in one arm, and admired the gem in his other hand. "You should have never bargained with this, human. This here's the gyth, and it's far more valuable than your life!" his grip tightened menacingly. "You're lucky, though, because the being who seeks this treasure is willing to grant an audience to the being who has it." He dropped Arthur, who could do nothing but gasp, trying to clear the dark spots wavering before his eyes. "Tie him up, lads!" Garrgan barked to his troop. "Bind the unicorn, too. The trio is nearly complete. I say it's time we pay our friend the visit he's been waiting a long time for!"  
And so, Arthur found himself the prisoner of the trolls once more. True, they were not returning to the Troll Castle...but where were they going instead? Arthur dreaded their destination.


	8. Chapter 8: The Wizard's Castle

By midafternoon, Merlin and Lily were halfway to the Troll Castle. They had stopped to enjoy a meal of strange fruits and berries Merlin had never tasted before, and a sort of juicy grain Lily called farran-wheat.  
"We should arrive before moonrise," Lily gauged, "It shouldn't be too bad, though I would have liked to get there before nightfall, what with the Underworlders prowling the darkness."  
Merlin slammed an edkidna—a fruit with a thick yellow rind—against the ground, and the rind slipped off easily, leaving the orange, melon-like flesh.  
"Nightfall and moonrise?" he echoed, "There's a difference here?"  
Lily smoothed her hair away from her face and nodded. "Here in Phantasm, the sun is on a fixed course, but the moon is not. The moon is actually a hive for large insects, called Moon-Beems, which glow when they move. The sunset awakens them, and they begin moving about their hive, which makes the moon-hive rise in the sky and glow. When the sun returns to the horizon, the activity of the Moon-Beems ceases, causing the moon to set."  
Merlin tried to imagine what this might look like.  
"I guess I'll have to see it to understand," he mused.  
"Are you ready to continue?" Lily asked.  
Merlin nodded and clambered back into Lily's hand. She stood up and gasped.  
"Calebryanicolinathanderson!" she cried, waving frantically.  
"Lilianancirellaminalibriella !" A young giant boy ran toward them. Lily set Merlin on a nearby cliff as the boy threw his arms around her.

"Brother," Lily murmured tearfully, "I was just coming to try to rescue you!"  
"Oh, sister!" her brother cried, "I nearly thought I would never see you again! It was Arthur! He saved me, and you'll never guess—" His eyes fell on Merlin and he gasped. "Why, there's another one!"  
Lily and her brother sat down on either side of Merlin's cliff.  
"Calebryanicolinathanderson, this is my friend Merlin, a human." She smiled down at Merlin, "Merlin, this is my brother. You can call him Caleb."  
"Your brother—the one we were on our way to rescue?"  
"Yes; what were you saying just now, brother? How did you escape?"  
"There was a human there, sister; he had a sword, and he unlocked my chains."  
Merlin sighed with relief. "That sounds like Arthur! That means he's alive!"  
Caleb ran a shaky hand through his hair, "For now, anyway. I tried to take him and the unicorn with me when I escaped, but I tripped and fell, and—well..."  
"Calebryanicolinathanderson," Lily burst out quickly, "You mean there was a _unicorn_ in the troll castle?"  
"Yes; it was wounded in the leg; he had been there for quite a while."  
Lily reached out and grabbed Caleb's shoulder. "What color was its horn?"  
"Well, the trolls painted it over with different colors a few times, but I think it was red."  
"The Red-Horned Unicorn is the one that guards the Phantasmagyth, isn't it?" Merlin asked.  
Lily nodded, but she didn't take her eyes off her brother. "All right, last and most importantly, I want you to think as hard as you can and remember: did Arthur have a gyth with him?"  
Caleb frowned. "I don't know," he said slowly, "I never saw. He did have a satchel." Caleb blinked, "Wait, how did Arthur get the gyth? Where is the Chain, then?"  
Merlin looked up at Lily, who had suddenly turned pale and sad. "If the trolls caught Arthur and the unicorn, he would—not knowing about the gyth—probably try to bargain with it."  
"Yeah, he would," Merlin confirmed. Arthur, when his own kingdom and his people were not at stake, routinely would value his life over a trinket. A desperate thought struck him. "Would the trolls—do they... You don't think that if they got the unicorn and Arthur showed them the gyth, that they would...y'know..." He could not bring himself to say it.  
Lily sighed, "No, they wouldn't. It's much worse.  
"I fear the trolls may have brought Arthur to the Wizard's Castle."

Miles away, Garrgan and his troop arrived at the gates of a large castle. Arthur thought how much it reminded him of Camelot. It only lacked one thing: people. The whole area was completely desolate. Garrgan removed Arthur's bonds as the gate opened on their approach.  
"It won't matter now whether you escape," he whispered to Arthur. "You're the Wizard's guest now; you can't get out till he lets you. I'd be on my best behavior anyway. I might be waiting to kill you, but he won't, if you do anything he doesn't like!"

The doors opened on their own as the troupe progressed through the atrium and down a long hallway to the Great Hall. The walls were coated with a strange, smooth white material, and embedded with large tubular tanks of bright-blue water. Arthur watched the wavering light, mesmerized. He did not expect a large creature to suddenly float into view—and then it bumped against the glass.  
Arthur jumped; the creature was almost human! Webbed hands, a face (with fish eyes and gills instead of a nose), and long legs ending in flippers gave a human-like appearance, while the blue-gray skin and brightly-colored hair streaming back or bound tightly with seaweed gave them an ethereal effect.  
The trolls laughed and jeered at Arthur's reaction. "Yah! Measely human has never seen a mermaid before! Not what you was expecting, eh?"  
Mermaids? Arthur shook his head. Now he was quite sure he'd seen everything this world had to offer.  
Garrgan reached the last door, but this one did not open. The troll-chief knocked.  
"Who iss it?" a creaking, singsong voice called from somewhere in front of the door. Arthur and the trolls cringed instinctively, looking around for the one speaking. All of them thought the same thing: was the Wizard invisible?  
"Oh Great One," Garrgan spoke, still unsure where to look, "I bring you gifts. Look, I have the gyth, and the unicorn! Here is the human who had both these things."  
He dragged Arthur to the front of the group.  
"Ahh, a khyoomaan," the voice sounded almost hungry. "I khave been waiting for sssoo long; at lasst, thiss day khass finally comme." The door opened, but no one moved.  
"Come in, khyooman," continued the eerie, languid voice, "Enter into the preyssence of the Wizzarrrd!"


	9. Chapter 9: Meet The Wizard

Garrgan bowed low as he shoved Arthur through the door. "And the reward, O Mighty Wizard?"  
"Your reward awaitsss you when you return to the gate," the Wizard sighed. "Sssend the uneekerrn withhh my sserrvannt. Leeeve mmeee!"  
Heavy footfalls caused them to turn. A twenty-foot tall cyclops planted itself at the end of the hall and held out its hand for the unicorn. One of the trolls led it hobbling forward. The cyclops did not bother with the tether, but lifted the animal bodily and bore it screaming away. The trolls walked slowly, leaving Arthur in the hallway with a disembodied voice and tanks full of mermaids.  
He looked around, ready to do battle.  
"Show yourself!" he commanded the wizard.  
The high-pitched, inebriated cackle echoed all over the hall.  
"Cumm inn, my ffriennd," the voice slurred, "I'm waaaiting jusst inssiiide."  
Arthur proceeded slowly. He entered a large, round room, surrounded by the blue tanks of water and mermaids. Round windows at the top lit the room pleasantly. Seated at a small table in the middle of the room was a young man, possibly no older than Arthur himself. He was neatly dressed in trousers and a tunic. He grinned at Arthur.  
"Sssooo," the slow, creaking voice spoke again, seeming to come from the young man at the table, "we meet, audacious traveler." The man's head lolled from side to side as he spoke, and he gestured to the other side of the table. "Come, you must be tired. There is a seat for you."  
As he pointed, a flagstone in the floor shifted, and a cushioned stool emerged from some hidden crevice. Arthur's skin tingled as he stepped forward and cautiously rested his weight on the stool. He looked down. The floor did not appear disturbed in the least. When he looked up again, the man had produced two cups and a teapot out of thin air, and he was pouring some of the steaming dark liquid into the cup meant for Arthur.  
Arthur blinked and pointed. "How did you—" he was so puzzled he could not even finish the question.  
The man cackled, a thin, reedy sound for one who appeared in the peak of health. Sitting closer to him, Arthur could see that the man's eyes rolled in his head, and they seemed strangely emaciated.  
"Magic!" he shrieked, "I am the Wizard, after all!" He laughed like it was some fantastic joke.  
Arthur sniffed his tea warily. It smelled sweet. Arthur took a sip. It tasted wonderful. He smiled.  
"You like it?" The man's voice was more mellow now, fuller and younger, not so strained.  
Arthur sipped again, "It's quite good," he set the cup down. "I don't think I've tasted its like."  
"Of course you haven't." The man's accent, Arthur decided, was very Northern, not much refined. "It's a flower native to Phantasm, called honest."  
Arthur mulled this over in his mind. "Honest tea," he muttered, and giggled at the pun.  
The Wizard chuckled too. "I'm Pierson, by the way. What's your name?"  
Arthur shook his hand. "My name is Arthur," he said. Pierson struck him as perhaps a merely misunderstood recluse, not an evil wizard!  
"Tell me, Arthur, how did you come to Phantasm?"  
"I came with my servant; his name's Merlin and he follows me everywhere. We were chasing a thief that had stolen a jewel and some gold, and we caught him, but before we could bring him back to the castle, we found ourselves here. We were caught by some goblins and Merlin was carried away by a gryphon, and I found some dwarves and they sold me to some trolls and—"  
Arthur's words had grown faster and faster, and when Pierson halted him with a gesture, Arthur's next thought centered on the soothing beverage in front of him. He took another gulp.  
"You said there was a jewel," At last, Pierson's voice matched his age, but his eyes had not lost their rolling, glassy look. Pierson produced the gyth and laid it on the table. "Would this happen to be it, laddie?"  
"Hm? Oh, yeah, that's it; and my name's not Laddie, it's Arthur."  
"Ah, yes; forgive me, Arthur. Now, what about the other piece?"  
Arthur reached the bottom of his cup and frowned. "Other piece? No, I think that was it. Say, this tea is quite possibly the best drink I ever—"  
Pierson finally lost his nerve and swore. His accent came thick as he leaned over the table. "Daen't toy with me, boy! Ye cannae ha' crossed the por'al withoot both pieces noo, whar is the bloody Chain?"  
Arthur did not seem fazed in the least. "Oh, well if that's the case," he jabbered on, "Merlin must have it."  
Pierson blinked. A slow smile slithered across his face. "And y'say Merlin follows ye everywhar ye go?"  
Arthur rolled his eyes, "Absolutely! Especially when he thinks I'm in danger. It's dreadfully annoying sometimes." Finally, he grew very pensive. He looked Pierson straight in the eye. "Can I have another cup?" he asked innocently.  
The veins in Pierson's neck bulged. He kept his voice low. "Ye kin have the whole pot," he snarled. "Jist ye sit right there whilst I—get somethin'."  
"I'll be here when you get back!" Arthur hollered after him.

In a private room down the hall, Pierson hauled open the door of his cabinet. One hundred years...one hundred stupid, wasted years! He uncorked a fresh flask of venim liquor and guzzled the contents. He felt the preserving effects freezing every last cell in his body in its current state. One hundred years of searching, of never changing, of never tiring, always searching—  
And in a single day, both halves of ultimate power would simply walk through his front door. Pierson laughed to himself. The irony was just too comical.


	10. Chapter 10: Merlin To the Rescue?

There were only a few hours of daylight left by the time Merlin and the giants reached the Wizard's castle.  
Lily stopped about two giant paces away from the castle.  
"This is as far as I go, Merlin." She bent down and let him step off her hand and to the ground. "Good luck."  
He nodded to her and Caleb. "Thank you."  
Caleb sniffed, "I just hope you find Arthur in time."  
"Yes, whatever you do, Merlin," Lily warned, "Don't let the Chain out of your sight until you have the gyth. Certainly don't put it in anyone else's sight, either."  
Merlin nodded, patting where the Chain hung beneath his shirt. "Right, keep it hidden. Well then," he turned around and strode purposefully toward the castle.

As with the trolls before, the gate opened at his approach. Merlin entered the courtyard, noting the emptiness of his surroundings. He walked into the atrium.  
"Hello?" he called.  
Instantly, a bloodcurdling scream erupted from one of the halls. Merlin knew the scream could only come from one person.  
"Arthur!" he yelled, running down the hallway.

Arthur, in the great hall, heard his name called, and automatically stood. "Merlin?" he responded, but the castle was as still as ever. Arthur shrugged and returned to his honest tea. He was on his last cup already. The pot was empty.

In the dark hallway, Merlin slowed as he came to a doorway. Listening carefully, he could hear the sounds of a muffled struggle. He must save Arthur! Merlin backed to the other side of the hall and ran full speed at the door. He crashed through it with all his might—right into the waiting hands of a towering cyclops! It held him firmly; no amount of wriggling could loosen it's hold. The only other occupant of the room was a short table with a round black object. The scuffle Merlin still heard seemed to be contained in that black object.  
"Ah, is that our next visitor?" a creaking voice laden thickly with a Northern accent spoke from the blackness. "Merlin, is it? How kind of ye to join us. Oh yes, Arthur's here too."  
Merlin jerked fruitlessly as he heard Arthur's voice gasping from somewhere in that thick, small object, "Merlin! Mer—"  
"Yes, that's enough," the first voice cut in again. "So sorry, me lad, that I had ta be the one to tell ye this, but ye've jist lost yer chance ta save yer friend. I've arranged for ye ta visit some friends o' mine. I'm afraid they'll be dull company, but ye'll get used ta that in nae time, ye ken? I'll be seein' ya, but ye'll no be seein' me. There's somethin' I jist know ye'll be dyin' ta give me. Enjoy your stay!"

"You fiend!" Merlin screamed as the cyclops dragged him from the room, "You viper! Keep your hands off Arthur! Wizard, I'm warning you, don't you dare touch him! He's not meant to die by your hand! I'm going to—"

What exactly Merlin might have been prepared to do cannot be known, for just at that moment, the cyclops tossed him into a sort of bath. Merlin sank under the water, but when he tried to swim back to the surface, he found a cover over the opening of the pool, with a space above the surface of the water just barely big enough for him to breathe in. Merlin gulped as much air as he could manage and swam down under the water to try and see if he could find a way of escape.  
He swam toward a large dark area at the side of the water, only to find that it was glass too thick to break or even be heard through.  
The rest of the surface was smooth and completely filled with water. There wasn't even the chance of any sort of bath like the one he'd entered by, either. Merlin sought to conserve air by not allowing himself to panic. He took stock of his surroundings. All around him was glass. There were colored rocks at the base of the horizontal tube that made the tank, and tall stalks of sone kind of seaweed. Merlin felt a leaf. It was smooth on one side, while the back was coated in some kind of gooey snot-like material. Merlin grimaced and swam away from the plants.  
All of a sudden, his senses kicked into high gear. Something had moved in the tank! What sort of creatures did the Wizard count as "friends"?  
He stared deep into the shadows, but he could distingush nothing amiss in the water.  
A dark blur flashed briefly in his periphery, and something brushed against his back. Merlin twisted around in the middle of the tank, trying to discover what exactly this thing might be. He looked as hard as he could, yet he did not even see the creature hurtling through the water at him until it slammed into his midriff, crashing him into the tank wall and driving what little breath he had from his lungs.


	11. Chapter 11: Friends In The Water

Merlin fought to keep from inhaling water when he saw the thing holding him. It was not quite a fish, having arms, legs, and bright violet hair; yet the eyes and the blue skin and the webbed hands, the dorsal fins, and the flippers bespoke a creature designed for aquatic life. Merlin ascertained that from the top of its head to the tip of its long foot-flippers, it was certainly taller than the tallest human-he guessed nine or ten feet, perhaps.  
It blinked at him, and then—wonder upon wonder—it spoke.  
"What are you doing here? I know you are a human; you are of the same race as the one who imprisoned my brothers and sisters and I in this terrible place so far from the waters of our home. Why have you entered our prison? Speak! I command you!"  
Merlin tried to sign that he could not speak underwater if he wanted to, and that he was now out of breath, thanks to this mermaid-creature.  
She still trapped him with one long arm, while with the other she plucked a leaf from the seaweed plant. She smeared Merlin's mouth and nose with it, leaving them coated with the goo.  
Merlin's mouth jerked open in spite of himself, and he took a rushing gasp of fresh air—but no water! The goo somehow let air in, but kept water out, no matter how much Merlin stretched his jaw and tested the membrane's capacity.  
The mermaid shoved him against the wall again. "Enough! Now speak!"  
Merlin tried to remain calm in this bizarre situation.  
"My name is Merlin, and my friend and I were sent here by the troll who stole the Phantasmagyth. I have one piece, and he has the other—"  
"So you thought you could rescue him all on your own, little Merlin?" the mermaid mocked. "How do I know you're not after one of us for some other kind of treasure? The wizard is your kinsman after all; don't all humans want the same thing?"  
Merlin shook his head, not an easy feat when one has a long, lanky arm pressed firmly against one's neck.  
"No we don't. The wizard may want the Phantasmagyth, but my friend and I just want to return to our own world."  
"Why did the wizard place you in the tanks?"  
Merlin remembered the wizard's words about something he would be "dying to give him."  
"I think he wants to kill me," Merlin concluded. "Please," he begged the mermaid, "I must rescue my friend. Will you help me?"  
The mermaid released him. "I will help on one condition: you must defeat the wizard and allow us to return to the Lake from whence we came."  
Merlin sighed; did he always have to be the one to save everyone? Yet perhaps setting everything right was the only way to be able to return safely. If a portal still remained from Phantasm to Camelot, who knew what the wizard could do if he still had the power? Merlin didn't even know what sort of power the wizard had now, except to subdue everyone in Phantasm and to make objects like the black thing speak.  
"Very well," Merlin sighed, "help me stop the wizard."  
The mermaid nodded judiciously. "My name is Nika. Come with me." She swam with him to another tank, where a huge merman floated, half again as tall as Nika. His deep-red hair was cut short and uneven, with a single long lock wrapped continuously around his head like a turban.  
"This is Gondu," she said. "You must wake him. He knows where the wizard may have taken your friend, and how to get there."  
Merlin hovered in front of the gigantic creature. There seemed to be a hazy film over his eyes. He did not move, and seemed to stare without seeing.  
"What's the matter with him?" Merlin asked.  
"He is asleep," Nika said, "an enchantment wrought by the wizard. You must wake him."  
Merlin shook his head. "I have no magic here! I cannot undo any spells, nor can I cast spells of my own."  
Nika frowned. "On the contrary, it may be said that you are the only one who can. You woke me when I swam against you."  
"I what?" Merlin did not know how this could be possible. Lily had said that only Phantasmian magic would work on Phantasm, and Merlin didn't know any—  
The Chain! Merlin felt it's cold metallic touch, and recalled how it had released him from the enchantment that immobilized him after the goblin battle, how Lily had said that the Chain was the most powerful magic in Phantasm. The Chain gave him the ability to undo the wicked wizard's work! Merlin reached out and touched Gondu's shoulder.

The film over his eyes disappeared, and the merman rolled his head and stretched his muscular arms. Gondu's reach far exceeded the length of Merlin's body. The young warlock stared in awe as the magnificent creature eyed him solemnly.  
Nika embraced the large merman. "Gondu, this is the human Merlin. He has come to end the wizard's reign and return us to the Lake!"  
Gondu reminded Merlin of Sir Percival: large, strong, and not given to much speech. Gondu reached out and cupped his hand around Merlin's back in a grateful gesture. The span of his fingers encompassed the length of Merlin's back.  
"Merlin is trying to escape the tanks. The wizard has captured his friend and holds the gyth."  
Gondu scowled.  
Merlin asked him, "Nika said you know where the wizard might be holding my friend. Can you take me there."  
"There is a secret room," Gondu rumbled, "The tanks are all around, but they do not see into this secret room. There is a place where the tanks open, that leads right to the secret room. I will bring you there."  
Nika produced a length of seaweed, which she fastened around Gondu's chest. "Hold on to this, Merlin," she instructed as Gondu presented his back. "Gondu will swim with you on his back."  
Merlin wrapped his arms through the harness.  
"Here we go!" Gondu roared, and pushed off the rock and down the tunnel.

Merlin watched Gondu's powerful arms sweep through the water, combing the water behind him like deep-water oars. Combined with the propulsion of his foot-flippers, the merman moved through the water faster than anything Merlin had ever observed. The water rushing against his face made it difficult for him to keep his eyes open, but the uandino over his mouth held. In a very short time, Gondu slowed and smoothly kicked straight upward. Merlin saw a round hatch of some sort at the top of the tank. Gondu swam up to this, tested it briefly with his webbed fingers, and then drove his fist into the cover. Merlin untangled himself from the seaweed harness, and Gondu assisted him out of the tank. Merlin escaped the water for the first time in nearly an hour, and he sat on the top of the tank and scraped the uandino-goo from his face, grateful to be free once again. He pulled his feet out of the water and tucked his knees to his chest as his wet clothes seemed to pick up even the slightest breeze, to say nothing of the persistent gusts wafting through the area. The area seemed to be a gigantic steel box around the tanks, the only light coming from the tanks themselves and small windows along the sides. One looked like a duct of some sort. Gondu, from within the tank, gestured toward it.  
"That one leads to the room outside the secret room," he explained. "May you find your friend." Gondu reached out of the tank and covered Merlin's knees with his hand.  
"I won't forget my promise," Merlin assured him. He reached into his collar and pulled out the Chain. Tugging hard and fast, he separated a single link from it, and the broken Chain mended itself. He handed the link to Gondu.  
"Give this to Nika. She'll know what to do."  
Gondu nodded and tied the link securely in his turban as he swam away. Merlin stood on the water tank to reach the open duct.

"All right, wizard," he muttered as he pulled himself by his elbows through the narrow, windy space, "It's time to finish this."  
As he crawled over the openings into other rooms, he ignored them until he heard one whinnying.


	12. Chapter 12: Arthur Gets A Tour

Back in the great hall of the castle, Arthur finished his tea, and Pierson returned. Arthur noticed that the strange man was smiling. Pierson even allowed himself a chuckle.  
"What's so funny?" Arthur asked.  
"What's so funny?" Pierson echoed, "You're Arthur, and your servant's name is Merlin." He giggled again.  
Arthur frowned. "Yes? So?"  
Pierson raised his eyebrows, "Arthur? Merlin? Really? I don't suppose this servant of yours is a wizard by any chance?"  
"Oh no," Arthur shook his head, "At least, not any more than you are!"  
Pierson tipped his head. "Arthur, where are you from?"  
"The kingdom of Camelot, in the land of Albion," Arthur declared proudly.  
Pierson's eyes opened wide, "Then you're the Arthur? The King Arthur, wi' the knights of the round table and all that?"  
Arthur shrugged, "The Round Table is an old custom we do not use these days. But I am king."  
Pierson immediately bowed, "Well, forgive me, yer Majesty, I had no idea I was entertaining royalty! Please, would you like a tour of my castle?"  
Arthur stood and smiled. "I would dearly love a tour," he replied.  
"Right this way, your highness."

Pierson led Arthur out into the hallway. The young king stopped and stared pensively at the walls with their tanks of listless merfolk. Pierson wondered if he was going to ask about them.  
Arthur snapped out of his funk, tapping the wall as he did so.  
"Pierson, what is this material? I've never seen its like."  
"That?" Pierson bustled Arthur down the hall and into another room. "Oh, let me show you. It is a shellfish native to this world, called a meir."  
Pierson led Arthur to a large bath in the center of the room, filled with rocks on which large bivalve mollusks crawled. Their shells had a coating of the same white, hard material.  
"To harvest the meirshell without killing the animal, they are taken out and dried. The coating cracks off after about an hour, and the meir is returned to the pool with no harm done. The coating can be melted down and formed into any shape I wish. It cleans easily and looks very nice."  
Arthur admired the creatures. "That is amazing!" he gushed.  
"I'm glad you like it, highness. Now if you'll just follow me, I'll show you more of the grounds."  
As they walked, Pierson also asked many questions of Arthur.  
"So that sword you have, is it really Excalibur?"  
"I'm sorry?"  
"Where did you get it from? Did it rise out of a lake in the hand of a fairy, or did you pull it out of solid stone?"  
"This? It's just a normal sword. I got it from the armory."  
"Ah... And Queen Guenivere—"  
"Hang on!" Arthur stopped his host with a very red face. "Queen? Gwen is a palace servant, nothing more."  
"Is she, now?" Pierson challenged significantly.  
Arthur frowned in suspicion. "Why do I get the feeling that you think you know more about me than I know about myself? Talking of Merlin as a wizard, and Gwen as a queen—that would, of course, mean that she's married to me, which can never happen."  
"Of course not," Pierson smiled artfully, "Idle speculation, milord, excuse me." He led Arthur to a place he called the "mechanics room."  
"This is where all the magic happens. See?" He turned a crank and a stone with a stool attached to it lowered from the ceiling. "We're right below the great hall here. I give a signal up there, and the signal goes down here, where my servants are waiting to obey my orders."  
Arthur blinked, "I did not know you had any servants. According to what you told the trolls, and if everyone else in this world are to be believed, there are no other humans here besides Merlin, yourself, and I."  
Pierson grinned condescendingly, "Did I say my servants were human?" He pushed open a door, and Arthur entered a room where several ogres bustled about a large tank of water. He recognized it as the same sort of tank that surrounded the hallways and rooms in the castle. Only one thing was different: the merfolk were fighting. The Underworlders seemed strangely afraid of the tank. About the only thing they could do was add large amounts of a green potion to the water. This potion seemed to have no effect on the creatures. They gathered around the openings, reaching out to drag the ogres into the water.  
Pierson strode forward urgently.  
"What happened?" he asked an ogre.  
"The merfolk are awake, sir," the ogre replied. "We cannot sedate them."  
Pierson glanced over at Arthur, who waited patiently with no sign that he even cared about the current situation.  
"Sedation can wait, as long as our prisoner has been taken care of—" he raised his eyebrows significantly.  
The ogre dropped his gaze. "The, ah, the pris—"  
Pierson lunged and grabbed the ring hanging from the ogre's snout. He pulled it, causing the creature to yelp in pain.  
"What happened with the prisoner, Skoon?"  
Skoon whimpered as his whole focus centered on the wave of intense pain radiating from his nose. "I don't know, master! Maybe the merfolk have already disposed of the body—"  
"You idiot! You mean you can't find him?"  
"Can't find whom?" Arthur asked, now approaching Pierson.  
Pierson watched his guest carefully. He was no longer overwhelmed with honest, that much was clear. There was still a chance that Pierson could maintain control of the situation.  
"Ah, just a minor matter, sire. Yes, I have Underworlders in my employ, but sometimes they can't even manage the simplest instruction." He waved his hand dismissively, "Shall we continue the tour?"  
"Right behind you, Pierson," Arthur consented heartily.

The pair continued through the towers. Pierson escorted Arthur through his greenhouse full of flourishing venim bushes. He explained in great detail the miraculous qualities of the plant, how it effectually preserved the current state of anything in prolonged contact. Pierson told of his great discovery, of how he had devised a method of distilling the flower into a sort of liquor, which he drank every day.  
"Keeps me going, it does," Pierson chortled as he finished one flask and tucked another into his waistcoat. He winked at Arthur, "It's a wretched bad habit, that; I'd give ye a sample, but I wouldn'a wish ye to get bitten by the monster!" Pierson continued on into a smaller room behind the greenhouse. Arthur was a bit more tentative; what monster was Pierson referring to?

Following the man, Arthur could not miss the fact that there was something bothering him.  
"What's wrong, Pierson?" he asked.  
Pierson whirled around and jumped. "Nothing!" he snarled, then caught himself. "Ah, that is to say-"  
"Does it have something to do with the prisoner you lost?" Arthur inquired.  
Pierson lost all his "kindly host" demeanor. He glared, "Where did you hear that?"  
Arthur stopped in the middle of the dim room full of torches and braziers and smithing tools. "I heard it from you," he could not help himself; the tea had obviously affected him, making him tell the truth whether he wanted to or not. He was no longer following blindly, but a direct question still elicited a direct answer. "You said something about another prisoner when you were speaking to that ogre." A suspicion formed in Arthur's mind, and he voiced it immediately. "I'll bet it was Merlin, wasn't it?"

Pierson turned away and seized something from a table hidden in the shadows in front of him.  
"All right, your Majesty," he grunted, "You've caught me. Yes, I captured your friend because he had something I thought I needed. You see, I had already received half of it from your hand." He turned around and pulled the gyth out of his pocket. "You were foolish to give it to me so willingly. You see, this gem that you do not seem to prize so highly possesses a great power, the greatest power in all of Phantasm. When hung on a chain, it gives the wearer absolute power over all the beings in Phantasm."  
Arthur put two and two together. "The Chain-Merlin has it!"  
"Yes; I wanted to kill him, but apparently he's evaded capture. No matter," he held up the object he'd retrieved from the table. "It looks like the goblins have made me one of my own!" He cackled madly and took another swig of the venim-liquor. "Let's try it out, shall we?" He brought the two pieces together, the gem and the chain.  
Arthur heard a slight "click", and the Phantasmagyth glowed with a white light brighter than any torch.  
"YES!" Pierson crowed, "YES! THE POWER IS MINE!"  
Arthur saw his chance to escape the madman. He seized a dented, rough-edged sword from the table beside him and swung it at Pierson.  
Pierson merely dodged the blow and shook his head. "Ah-ah," he wagged his finger as if reprimanding a naughty young child. "Wee laddies shouldn'a play with the bonny broadsword!" A door opened in the wall next to Arthur, and a pair of ogres emerged. Arthur quickly slashed at them, causing both the ogres to shy away from the blade, dull as it was. Arthur quickly rolled between the legs of the nearest ogre and slipped out the door behind them.  
Pierson watched him leave, and then went back to admiring the glistening gem.  
"Get him," he whispered to all the Underworlders in his command.


	13. Chapter 13: The Battle Begins

Arthur, in escaping the room with the smithing tools, found himself running right into the castle stables. What luck! He could get a horse now, and ride off to the safety of-  
"Merlin!" Arthur groaned; how would he know whether to look for Merlin, or even if his servant, in escaping from the merfolk, had managed to leave the castle as well? A soft whinny erupted from one of the stalls. Arthur saw the tip of a horn protruding from the door; it was blood-red. The unicorn! Arthur realized his good luck: if the unicorn typically protected the Phantasmagyth, it could probably sense where each part was-for example, the Chain ostensibly still in Merlin's possession. If he could get the unicorn to look for the Chain, he would find Merlin, too!  
Arthur ducked into the stable. He could faintly hear the grunts and growls of the Underworlders searching for him. He snuck down the row till he reached the unicorn's stall. The great white creature blinked at him, obviously remembering him from their shared imprisonment in the hands of the trolls. Arthur glanced down and saw that the wound on its leg had been covered over with a brace made of meirshell.  
"Don't worry," Arthur assured it, "I'm here to get us out!"  
The unicorn seemed to understand, for instead of bolting immediately when Arthur opened the door, it stood and waited for the young king to climb on.  
"All right," Arthur said, "Now, let's find Merlin!"  
The unicorn did not move. Its ears and nose twitched as if it sensed something. Arthur almost did not want to kick at its flanks like a common horse. "Come on," he urged, as the noise of the Underworlders drew closer to the stables, "you want to get the Phantasmagyth back, don't you?"  
The unicorn picked up its head. Arthur smiled; he must have found the right word. "Phantasmagyth; you know that word? Go on! Find the Phantasmagyth."  
Arthur half expected the unicorn to exit the stable and comb the fields outside; surely Merlin would have made it that far by now. Instead, the unicorn headed straight for the door that Arthur had just used-the one that led straight back into the castle where Pierson was waiting!  
"No!" he tried to pull on the unicorn's mane, to turn it around, something! "Not that way!"  
Rearing up, the unicorn put both silvery hooves against the door, and it collapsed under its weight. With Arthur clinging close to it, the unicorn charged through the excited groups of Underworlders littering the halls, evidently headed to whichever piece of the Phantasmagyth was more important. Arthur wondered if it would be the gyth and Pierson, or Merlin and the Chain. Arthur and the unicorn entered a room and found a gang of ogres trying to squeeze themselves into an opening just barely narrow enough for a person. The unicorn neighed loudly in challenge. Arthur flourished his sword, and as the ogres turned to attack, he lunged and swiped and slew them all. A smaller figure dropped out of the opening.  
"Merlin!" Arthur cried in surprise and relief.  
Merlin fought to get his breath back as he looked up and smiled.  
"Bandiras," he murmured, "Good work."  
"Bandiras?" Arthur watched his friend, worried that his brain must still be waterlogged. "Merlin, it's me, Arthur."  
Merlin had completely missed his friend, his attention focused on the rumblings and whinnying of the unicorn. "I know," he answered no one that Arthur could see, "thank you for coming to rescue me."  
"Um," Arthur held out a hand for his friend, "I'm up here, Merlin. Now come on, the Underworlders are close behind us!"  
Merlin finally looked up and blinked, "Arthur?" he noticed his master for the first time. "What-how did you escape? I thought for sure that Pierson-"  
Arthur hauled Merlin up behind him, "He is, and there's no time; I'll explain on the way! All right, unicorn, let's go!"  
The unicorn turned its head and whinnied.  
"What do you mean?" Merlin asked.  
The unicorn stamped and neighed again.  
Arthur frowned at the way Merlin glanced at him and said, "No, I don't think so."  
The king of Camelot (if they could ever make it back in one piece) rolled his eyes. "Is there something I'm missing, Merlin? Because for all I can tell, it looks like you're actually conversing with the unicorn."  
Merlin looked at Arthur, and realization dawned in his face. "As a matter of fact, according to Bandiras, here, you are missing something: fairy dust."  
"What the blazes does fairy dust have to do with anything?" Arthur stormed, but Bandiras suddenly neighed and wheeled, charging out of the room.  
"Fairy dust in your mouth and ears helps you speak and understand every creature, for there are some: the merfolk, the fairies themselves, and the unicorns, for example, who do not speak the human tongue."  
"You got to meet the fairies, then? Was this before or after the gryphon carried you off and left me to be captured by trolls?"  
Merlin shook his head as Bandiras whinnied to him. "We can tell each others' stories once we get to safety. Do you have the gyth?"  
"No, Pierson took it from me."  
"Who is Pierson?" The atrium was just on the other end of the hall.  
"The wizard," Arthur answered, "Turns out he is not a wizard after all, just some crazy human who thinks the jewel will give him ultimate power."  
"You let him take it?" Merlin cried.  
"It's not like I had a choice, Merlin. He put it on that chain of his and had me chased out of the room!"  
Bandiras charged out the door.  
"Wait!" Merlin cried. "Bandiras, is it possible the wizard knows how to make another Chain?"  
Bandiras slowed in the courtyard. They could not hear anyone following them at present.  
"Well that's a relief," Merlin remarked.  
"What is?" Arthur panted. These hairsbreadth escapes were really wearing on him.  
Merlin turned to respond to Arthur. "Bandiras says that the gyth will attach to another chain made of Phantasmian metal, but it would not be as powerful as the true Phantasmagyth."  
Just as he finished saying this, all three heard a high-pitched squeal. A vampire bat the size of a full-grown man emerged from the top of the castle. Perched on its back was Pierson himself, with the alternate Phantasmagyth hanging around his neck. Underworlders began pouring out of doors and crawling out of holes in the ground.  
Arthur urged Bandiras out of the melée.  
"I really don't see how this is any less powerful!" he hollered at his servant.  
Merlin had no chance to reply. In the space of a single breath, the black shadow of the bat swooped over them, and once again, Arthur had the misfortune of seeing his servant and friend carried away in the claws of a malevolent creature to an unknown fate.


	14. Chapter 14: One Last Snatch

The minute Merlin left his back, Bandiras wheeled about and uttered a loud shriek that carried far over the noise of the crowd. Having done this, he bore down into the fray with his sharp horn at the ready. Arthur focused his energy to protecting his mount and himself on all sides, swinging his sword and slashing away at the Underworlders.

High above the fray, Merlin struggled against the clutches of the bat. The beast held him by the chest, its claws tearing at his sides. Pierson, meanwhile, had purposely directed the bat to do so, for it put him at a perfect vantage point to reach the Chain hanging around Merlin's neck. The young warlock was forced to ignore the pain in his sides and push away Pierson's grasping hands with his own.  
"Give it to me," Pierson rasped, sounding like the old man he should have been. "It's mine!"  
The gyth glinted in the sunlight as the bat wheeled again. Merlin fought waves of torment as he narrowed his focus to one objective: get the gyth while Pierson was distracted by the Chain. He waited till Pierson overcompensated and leaned too far over the side of the bat, and twisted alongside the bat's neck. His fingertips came in contact with something hard, and he pulled.  
At the same instant, a shriek erupted right next to Merlin's head—but it was not the bat. It frightened the bat, so that it released Merlin suddenly, and he fell, screaming, still clutching the object, right onto the waiting back of a gryphon! It took a few seconds for Merlin to comprehend what had happened.  
"Kharrah?" he gasped.  
She crowed in greeting. Merlin looked up to see Lily, Caleb, and a host of other Phantasmians—fairies, gryphons, and unicorns—falling upon the enemy.  
Merlin glanced at the object he had taken from Pierson: a small flask. Kharrah banked like she was going to dive into battle.  
"No!" Merlin cried, "Get the bat! Pierson still has the gyth!" Kharrah obediently charged for the offending beast.

Arthur cheered wildly when the reinforcements came. He was so amazed to see the two giants taking on the Cyclopes, the gryphons falling like furry harbingers of death upon the minotaurs, and the unicorns charging at the ogres while the fairies served as a very painful and pervasive diversion, that he almost failed to see the werewolf charging straight for Bandiras' left flank. Reacting as swiftly as he could, Arthur swung his sword and parried in time to prevent any lasting damange to the unicorn, but the wolf caught the force of the blow and turned it back on Arthur, throwing the young knight from his mount.  
Arthur dropped his sword as he fell, but it landed right next to his hand. He had just enough time to grab it while Bandiras turned upon the wolf, stabbing it deep in the flank. The wolf threw back its head and howled, seeming to stretch out in the same moment. When Arthur blinked, there stood before him a large, strong man covered in thick dark hair, with blood dripping from a wound in his leg. The man snarled at Arthur as it grabbed a rapier from a fallen goblin. Arthur barely had time to put up his guard before the werewolf lunged, point at the ready.  
The swords crossed, but Arthur, as the more experienced swordsman, readily assessed all the ways he could use his adversary's fury and weight versus the flimsy, fragile rapier as weapons in his own favor. He pushed back only slightly, to allow the werewolf to increase momentum, then he wrested out from under him, intending that the large man should stumble forward and break his own blade in the fall. That, at any rate, was the intent. When it happened, the werewolf was very close to Arthur, close enough to heave a breath laced with the stench of rotting carrion in his face. Arthur staggered before the breath, and could not throw himself away fast enough. The werewolf staggered over the top of him, and Arthur just barely seized his chance to slip his sword inside the man's ribcage, killing it as it fell. His ploy succeeded, but now he was trapped under the body of the dead werewolf. Push as he might, he could not move an inch. He could only wait and hope that Merlin succeeded in his own venture.

Merlin and the gryphon tumbled about in midair, locked in combat with Pierson and the vampire bat. The Chain flopped around Merlin's neck as Kharrah banked and wheeled. Pierson fought to bring the two animals head to head, so that he would be close enough to grab the Chain from Merlin's neck. Finally, he got his wish.  
Kharrah flew in close and attached to the bat's body with all four claws, rending and tearing without mercy. The bat ceased flying to scratch back with its wing claws, hanging the entire weight of itself and two humans on the strength of Kharrah's wings. Merlin and Pierson were so intent on wrestling each other for their respective pieces of the Phantasmagyth that they did not notice how much Kharrah was dipping until Merlin nearly got a minotaur's mace in his face.  
"One more go, and then we have to pull away, Kharrah," he called in her ear.  
Pierson was too busy scrabbling for the Chain to realize what Merlin was about to do.  
"One, two—three!" Merlin put every ounce of strength he had into a desperate lunge for the gyth, and the instant his hand closed around it, he yelled, "Go!"  
Kharrah released the mangled bat, and Pierson with it! The trouble was, Merlin did not realize until too late that Pierson had a hold on his jacket. The jerk when Kharrah pulled away was sufficient to release that hold, but not before it pulled Merlin halfway off the gryphon's back. He fell, shortly after Pierson, and the gyth bounced out of his grasp.  
"No!" he gasped, and hit the ground hard. Merlin had only struggled to his knees by the time Pierson was out from underneath the dead bat and stumbling toward the place where the gem lay. Desperate, Merlin seized a goblin rapier and lunged with all his strength at Pierson, catching him across the thigh.  
Pierson collapsed just inches short of his goal. Merlin pushed himself just a bit further and nicked Pierson on his outstretched arm.  
"No!" Pierson howled like a wounded animal. He tried to reach out with the other hand, but by then Merlin was on his feet, standing over the gem. He pricked Pierson's hand, then leaned over his fallen adversary and picked up the gyth. He held it against the Chain around his neck, and it clicked into place. Instantly, Merlin felt its power coursing through his entire body, and the Phantasmagyth glowed with the blinding light of a thousand stars.  
Every Underworlder immediately cringed and shrank away from the light. The fighting ceased.  
"Bandiras!" Merlin called.  
"Yes, Master of the Phantasmagyth," The unicorn appeared at Merlin's side.  
Merlin shook his head and slipped the Phantasmagyth off his neck.  
"I am not destined to be the master if anything," he declared, and slipped the Phantasmagyth over the Guardian's head.  
Bandiras tossed his head. "Underworlders, begone!" he thundered. There was a terrific earthquake, and when the commotion ceased, not a single Underworlder—living or dead—remained on the surface.


	15. Chapter 15: Remember Always

Lily offered her hand to Merlin.  
"You did it!" she gushed.  
Merlin shook his head and sat down in Lily's palm. "I could not have done it without the help of everyone else!"  
The giantess giggled as she joined her brother. "That's just what Arthur said!"  
Merlin saw Arthur laying, bloodied and still, in Caleb's hand. He ran across to his friend's side.  
"Arthur!" he cried, "Arthur, are you all right?"  
Arthur groaned, "I will be after a week's rest, considering the mess you got me into!" he smiled, showing that the blood was not his, and punched Merlin playfully in the shoulder.  
Merlin feigned offense, "My mess? If you had protected the gyth instead of trading it away, we could have been back home by now!"  
The one word had a profound effect on both men. They forgot fighting and trading punches in the light of a new problem.  
"How do we get home?" Merlin asked Lily.  
She smiled, "Bandiras can send you, now that everything is put to rights."  
"Almost everything," Caleb corrected his sister. He held Pierson by the collar between his fingers; the man limply flopped, since most of his body was paralyzed by the wounds from the goblin rapier. "What do we do with him?"  
Arthur stepped forward. "Why not give him to the trolls?" he suggested to the giant. "I hear they really appreciate having humans along in their caravans."  
Caleb grinned and bore the wailing man far away to the troll camp.

Lily set the two friends on the ground. Bandiras stood twenty paces away, evidently waiting to escort them back to Camelot.  
"Thank you for everything, Lily," Merlin said.  
"It was good to meet you two humans. I'll never forget you," she promised.  
"Ah, that reminds me," Merlin said. "When Pierson caught me in his castle, he tried to drown me in a tank full of merfolk. The Chain revived them, but they are still trapped."  
Lily nodded, "I will bring them back to the Lake," she said.  
"Thank you, my friend," Merlin said.

Together, Merlin and Arthur approached Bandiras.  
"We are ready," Merlin said.  
Arthur felt a tickling sensation around his ears. The next voice he heard was a grand, warm, horsey sort of voice.  
"Thank you, humans, for returning the Phantasmagyth to its rightful place, and for helping us defeat a terrible enemy. In return I, Bandiras, Guardian of Phantasm and the Phantasmagyth, will help you return to your own world."  
Arthur could not believe he was actually hearing the unicorn speak, after he had treated it like a dumb animal so shortly before. Merlin, on the other hand, did not seem fazed.  
"I told you," he said in response to Arthur's slack-jawed expression, "It's the fairy dust."

Bandiras led the pair into the forest. At the center was a clearing, but Merlin could sense that this was no ordinary clearing.  
Bandiras confirmed, "The minute you enter this clearing, you will return to your own world. Approximately five minutes will have passed from the time you left. Phantasm will never forget your valor. The deeds you have done and the courage you have shown will be passed on for many generations. Go forth as friends of Phantasm."  
Arthur and Merlin clasped hands and stepped into the clearing at the same moment. A rushing wind enveloped them, forcing them to close their eyes against its sting.

The first things Arthur heard when the wind died down were urgent voices calling and footsteps running toward him. The first things he saw were armored men, mounted on horses and carrying swords. It only dawned on him after he had brandished his weapon at each of them that these were his own men: Leon, Elyan, Gwaine, and even Percival.

"Your Majesty!" Sir Leon could not understand the sudden frenzy of the king, "What happened? Did you find the thief? Where are your horses?"  
Arthur blinked. "I did—What are...Horses? I mean, the man—" he stopped and looked at Merlin, unable to think straight, much less concoct a good enough tale to explain their dishevelled appearance that wasn't the truth. The chase through the forest seemed so long ago to Arthur, he had no idea what to say.  
Merlin had more experience in the area.  
"We left the horses behind to engage the man on foot," he explained. "We were just about to grab him when he just vanished into thin air without a trace." He boldly held the gaze of each knight in turn. "We have no idea where he went, and no hope of tracking him, either."  
"What," Gwaine scoffed, "You mean like magic?"  
Arthur flinched at the word, but Merlin turned his strange gaze on the knight.  
"Yes, exactly," he agreed, "magic. We have no choice but to abandon the search."  
The knights looked at each other, but at this point, Arthur had recovered enough to give the order himself.  
"Return to the castle. I don't think we're ever going to see the man again."  
"Yes, sire," Sir Leon and the others mumbled, but Sir Percival was not satisfied. Arthur and Merlin both looked bone-weary after one morning's chase, Merlin's clothes had suddenly disintegrated into tatters, and Arthur had dark blood and clumps of fur clinging to his mail, when there had been no animal in the forest, much less one with black, heavy fur!  
He stared at the two long enough for them to feel uneasy before he asked, "What happened to you?"  
"Nothing!" King and servant spoke in unison. Percival had no choice but to accept their answer.

Merlin arrived in Gaius' hovel and trudged gratefully to his bed.  
No sooner had he laid himself down than Gaius knocked on his door. The old physician frowned when he saw his apprentice in bed before noon.  
"What do you think you're doing?" he asked.  
"Arthur gave me the day off," Merlin muttered quickly.  
Gaius raised his eyebrow, but did nit voice any objection. Instead, he handed Merlin a packet.  
"This just came for you," he said.  
Merlin took it and examined it. "Who sent it?" he asked.  
Gaius shrugged, "One of the maids brought it, and she wouldn't say." He waited, obviously interested to see the contents of such a strange missive.  
Merlin brought the plain envelope close to his face. The paper had a familiar scent about it—very like the smell of the tanks in Pierson's castle. Merlin felt the slight bulge at the end of the envelope. Instantly, he knew who sent it. For the old physician's benefit, he feigned disinterest and tossed the envelope aside.  
"I'm tired, I'll open it later," he sighed.  
Gaius nodded. "I hope you're not falling ill, Merlin. It's only midday, I fail to understand how you can be so sleepy so soon." He stood, as if waiting for Merlin to break down and tell him the truth.  
The young warlock held to the ruse. "If I am getting sick, Gaius," he rolled over, "you'll be the first to know."  
Gaius took the hint. "Very well," he said, leaving the room and closing the door behind him.

The minute Gaius was gone, Merlin seized the envelope and tore it open. Inside was a message with only two words: "Remember Always." Merlin put out his hand and caught the second item from the packet: a single gold link from a chain, one that could fit around his finger like a ring. Merlin slipped it on, and lay back in his bed. This was going to be one adventure he would not forget for a very long time.


End file.
